OCTOBER 2015: MONTH OF THE HOLY ROSARY

October, the month of the Holy Rosary, celebrates the spiritual beauty of the Rosary, emphasizing the need for prayer, fasting and sacrifice. The Rosary is a prayer. The rosary (notice lowercase) is a tool for this specific prayer.  The Rosary is a Christocentric setting for Lectio Divina, that is, a meditation on the Life of Christ, particularly His Ministry, Passion, Death and Resurrection. The Rosary is the prayer of the saints, and has a is easy to pray. It offers hope and healing.

Oct. 1: St. Therese Lisieux 

Oct. 2: St. Leger

Oct. 3: St. Menna

Oct. 4: Twenty - Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time, St. Francis of Assisi, more...

SEPTEMBER 2015: MONTH OF OUR LADY OF SORROWS

September, the month of Our Lady of Sorrows, remembers the suffering of Mary, Jesus' Mother. There are seven sorrows, seven afflictions that pierced her heart. Catholics commonly reflect upon each and they say daily one Our Father and seven Hail Mary's for each.

• The Prophecy of Simeon. (Luke 2:34–35)
• The Flight into Egypt. (Matthew 2:13)
• The loss of the child Jesus in the Temple. (Luke 2:43–45)
• Mary meets Jesus on the way to Calvary.
• Jesus dies on the cross. (John 19:25)
• The piercing of the side of Jesus, and Mary's receiving the body of Jesus in her arms. (Matthew 27:57–59)
• The body of Jesus is placed in the tomb. (John 19:40–42)

Palm Sunday is a day to honor Jesus as the Christ, that is, the Jewish Messianic King. It commemorates the day when Jesus rode through the streets on a borrowed donkey and the Jewish people spread palm branches and their garments before Him in homage. This signified their acceptance that their long-awaited prophecy was in the process of being fulfilled.

“Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion. Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Lo, your king comes to you ; triumphant and victorious is he, humble and riding on an ass, on a colt the foal of an ass.” (Zechariah 9:9) more...

“Our souls are restless until they find their rest in Thee.” - St. Augustine

Life isn’t easy. Each one of us has difficulties that we must work through in order to reach a place of peace and joy— which ultimately, is happiness. On our own, we can wander around in the desert, say for 40 years, as did the ancient Israelites, or we can follow the maps as received via the Church.

The Rosary being one of these maps will give us graces to persevere, the ability to find solutions to the challenges we face, and will help us reach our goals much sooner. By praying the Rosary, we are making an act of faith that no matter what happens, we will trust in God, do our best, live out our calling, and thus, serve God and others, fulfilling the twofold commandment of love: love God and your neighbor. more...

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.

The Glory Be is a very simple prayer, which is said at the end of each decade of the Rosary to bring a close to the particular Rosary Mystery being observed.

This prayer honors the individual three Persons in God: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. It is meant to be prayed with reflection for it deliberately emphasizes the name of each Person. Glory to God yes, but in particular to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit. more...

While St. Dominic is known for spreading the devotion of the Rosary throughout the world (as we know it in its present form), it would erroneous to solely give him the title of the “Rosary Saint.” So many Saints have illustrated by their words and actions the beauty and depth of the Rosary. In their own generation and environments, they encouraged the fervor for the “Divine Garland of Roses”. In fact, it is because of the countless witnesses of the communion of Saints, that we can have confidence that the Rosary is a powerful tool of healing, conversion, and for discerning God’s Will. There is no greater testimony than how they lived; we can trust their words and we should follow their example. Below is but a sample of thoughts from a selection of the Saints: more...

For many people, taking the time to say the Rosary is a chore.  The Rosary is very repetitive, and can be boring or tedious; it is hard to find the time, since saying one Mystery can take anywhere between 10-30 minutes.  Also, others believe that saying formal prayers is not relevant anymore asking: “isn’t the Rosary an archaic medieval practice for the uneducated? God likes prayers from the heart, spontaneous and not lengthy. He doesn’t want us to pray the same prayers day after day. In fact, Jesus condemns vain repetition: "And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words.”  (Matthew 6:7)

If we can work through these difficulties and any excuse that we find ourselves reverting to, then we will see that taking the time to pray the Rosary daily will actually influence our lives in a very positive way.  We will find that our discipline will improve; the vices that we struggle with will fall away from us; we will be more at peace with ourselves and those around us; and lastly, we will be confident that we are walking with God—not just making our own way alone. more...

The Our Father Prayer, also known as the Lord’s Prayer, is the prayer said at the beginning of the Rosary directly after The Apostles’ Creed, and is right before the three Hail Marys.  It is also the prayer that begins each decade.

Catholics, and even non-catholic Christians, claim that the Our Father is the most beloved of prayers in the Catholic Church’s treasury; it was taught to the Apostles by the Second Person of the Trinity, Jesus Christ. (Matt 6:9-13)  Since the Our Father is the response to the Apostles’: “teach us to pray, ” we can be assured that it is powerful and is the most perfect of prayers. There is so much depth to this prayer that The Catechism of the Catholic Church devotes one of its four parts to examining it.  Many argue that it is the summary of the gospels. St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas praise it: more...